There is a clear need to bring the study of female delinquency up to date with the theoretical and empirical work which has continued to focus on males. Recent increases in arrest trends for females suggest wider levels of involvement than can be explained by psychological or "personal problems" approaches which traditionally have been invoked to account for female delinquency. This proposed study of female delinquency encompasses four major research goals: (a) to determine the effects of certain social processes on patterns of female delinquency; (b) to compare the delinquencies of boys and girls in order to isolate etiological factors which operate for both sexes and those which are sex-specific; (c) to compare the patterns of female delinquency during a period before major societal sex-role changes occurred (1960) with the patterns of delinquency for a 1976 sample of girls; (d) to document concomitant changes in the handling of females/males by agents of the criminal justice system. To accomplish these goals a set of five sub-projects is proposed. These sub-projects involve the administration of questionnaires/interviews to a sample of incarcerated male and female delinquents as well as to a comparable sample of non-incarcerated male and female high school students. The historical phase of the project will consist of the comparison of these subjects with data previously collected on males and females who were incarcerated in these same institutions during the late 1950's. Additional historical materials will be obtained through retrospective accounts of incarcerated and non-incarcerated women who were adolescents in the late 1950's and early 1960's. Finally, a sample of police officers will be administered questionnaires concerning their perceptions of changes in the delinquencies of girls and changes in their own behavior relative to females. Observations will also be conducted to determine the extent to which a double standard of enforcement currently prevails in the handling of males and females.